Friday, April 5, 2013

I only knew Roger Ebert from his movie reviews. What I have learned today is he was an unabashed, unafraid liberal. He called out opponents of ObamaCare. He called out the corporations and their political lackeys who prey on the sick and the poor for profit. He said this about ObamaCare:

"My reasoning brings me back again and again to these truths: Health care is good. There comes a time in most lives when we will need it. Apart from the very richest sliver of people at the top, no one can afford to have a really major illness. Even with an excellent insurance plan, they'll find there is a limit to the costs that can be paid. If they are so sick they lose their jobs, chances are their job-connected insurance will be lost, too. If they are lucky and recover, they'll have a Pre-Existing Condition that makes them uninsurable. They can't risk getting sick again.

Every Western democracy except ours offers Universal Health Care. It is not always perfect, and we are told horror stories about this or that case in Canada or France. In America our horror stories are worse, because they're caused not by imperfections in a health care system, but by the complete absence of one. Many people know of at least one family that has been destroyed as a unit by the unavailability of affordable health care."

I always laughed at those "horror" stories the wingnuts would use as reasons not to pass ObamaCare. Ebert was absolutely correct. For every one "horror" story from Cananda, there are probably hundreds of real horror stories resulting from the crass neglect and indifference of corporate-run healthcare.

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

"So let’s sum up today in North Carolina news that you can use, shall we? Don’t move there if you’re any religion that isn’t Christianity. Don’t move there if you’re at all attached to the Constitution, except probably the Second Amendment. Don’t move there if you’re a parent that has a kid in college and needs the tax deduction for said child to continue, which it totally should because you’re paying for the little brat’s everything. Don’t move there if you’re a college kid that wants to vote where you go to college. Don’t move there if you need to vote at any “unusual” times. Don’t move there right before an election, because you won’t be able to register on election day. You know what? Just don’t move there."